This week’s installment of HBO’s Generation Kill was a big step in the right direction. Slowly but surely, we’re starting to put names to faces, individual personalities are emerging from the homogenous whole, and the action is heating up. Ooo plus, we got our THIRD Rescue Me sighting, with former priest Mick Gavin (Robert John Burke) appearing as some general on a bridge. Sweet.
There’s still plenty of Ed Burns/David Simon dialog to go around– this show is so inundated with military jargon its often times impossible to discern what anyone is talking about. But some pieces are starting to come together. For instance, we know our boys are in Bravo Company. We know their company Commander is a huge idiot who gets them lost and never effectively relays orders from Godfather. We know that Pete from Rescue Me (Neil Jones) is a Sgt. Major (who is, by the way, fantastic on this show and steals every scene he’s in). We know that the team leader of Bravo 3 is easily spooked and shoots up a car for no apparent reason. And we know that the boys we follow most are part of Bravo 2.
Unfortunately, Those Scenes From Next Week did not look at all promising. They make next week’s installment seem like a major lull in action and a recession to the political pov swapping chit chat of Part 1. Honestly, I’m having a tough time staying committed to this show. As always, I’m going to give it a full 3 episodes before I think about cutting it off, but as of now, I just don’t feel compelled enough to keep watching based on the quality of the program alone. I’m hoping that with each new installment, I’ll grow to care about these soldiers as individuals more and more. Otherwise, I just won’t have enough invested to warrant the 70 minutes a week for the next month this miniseries requires of me.
Grade: B
Agree that episode 2 was a step in the right direction. Just finished episode 3, and I do think the various characters and storylines are coming into their own. I didn’t understand at first why Simon/Burns would create a drama about a contemporary war that’s being extensively documented (even if most of this documentation isn’t yet making it into the public debate), but I’m starting to get it. I think.
Any word on whether anyone is actually watching this? Every other bus in nyc is covered in a “Generation Kill” ad, but whenever I point them out and ask if anyone’s seen it I get blank stares.